To ensure that a food item, such as a steak, maintains good contact with and does not stick to a barbecue grill, it is necessary that the grill first be clean and well-oiled. Cleaning the grill can be accomplished by using a wire brush or steel wool pad. However, oiling the grill is more problematic. A common way to oil a grill is by saturating a paper towel with oil, then using tongs to hold the paper towel to apply the oil on the cooking grate while it is hot. However, this approach is time consuming, messy, and wasteful.
Several prior art references relate to devices for making the oiling process easier. U.S. Patent Published Application No. US2005/0207820 to Franczak, for example, discloses a barbeque grill oiler that includes an applicator with a sponge and/or scrubber for contacting the grill to apply oil to the grill. However, this reference does not disclose a mechanism for careful control of the flow of the oil and requires that the grill be cool before application. As another example, U.S. Patent Published Application No. US2006/0029457 to Dale et al. discloses a grill oiler for applying oil to a grill comprising a handle, an applicator body attached to the handle, and an applicator surface attached to the applicator body. However, this device has many parts, suffers from an overly complex design, and could be difficult to clean.